(October 12)  YUCCA VALLEY— The Yucca Valley Town Council has approved a resolution that commits the town to assisting the Hi-Desert Water District with the financing for a sewer system that is to be constructed over the next several years.
The council stated in the resolution that the town stood ready to make a “substantial financial contribution to the district, currently anticipated to be approximately $70 million.” The council’s resolution indicated the town’s financial participation will be contingent upon the shape of town finances, so that the town contribution “will not jeopardize the fiscal integrity of the town’s general fund.”
The town will structure its participation in the project through a lease arrangement with the district for the infrastructure. That lease agreement will not be executed until the project is 30 percent completed.
The resolution called upon the water district to utilize the town’s largesse to lower assessments property owners will be hit with to pay for the wastewater system.
The town’s participation will include between $4 million and $5 million that will go for road repairs that will be necessary to reinstate pavement that must be displaced to accommodate trenching for the sewer pipe to be laid.
Yucca Valley, with a population of 20,700, is entirely reliant on septic systems. In 2007, the state agency responsible for protecting water quality adopted a resolution identifying the town of Yucca Valley as one of 66 communities throughout the state with groundwater threatened by the continuing overuse of septic systems. As such, the California Regional Water Quality Control Board has imposed septic discharge prohibitions due to be triggered as of May 19, 2016. Under that mandate, phase 1 of a wastewater system must be completed or significantly on its way to completion by that date or the state will initiate enforcement action. The first phase of the project is to cover the downtown area of Yucca Valley, the area most proximate to the heart of the groundwater basin.  Similarly, phase 2 must be completed or nearly completed by May 19, 2019 and phase 3 must be completed by May 19, 2022. The last two phases lie further out where future concentrated development is most likely to occur.